Top Stories

Mark Feffer started as a videotape editor back when there was videotape to edit, then joined the news desk at Dow Jones News/Retrieval, the company's first online product. He produced The Wall Street Journal's first multimedia CD-ROMs and published his novel, "September," in 2006. He lives in Pennsylvania with his wife, their fierce terrier, and a schnauzer who wonders why she ever left California. He's a member of the Project Management Institute.

Tip of the Day

You can learn a lot about a company by the questions it asks during an interview. For example, managers may probe your knowledge of a technology. It’s not enough to be able to write most programs in their language, they want to make sure you know the ins and outs of the language, too.

Companies that focus on such questions tend to place a high value on your current skill set. They want you to be able to hit the ground running almost from Day 1. You might be a great coder and a brilliant engineer, but if you don’t know their preferred language, you’re probably out of luck.

As for your coworkers, many of them have likely been working with the current technologies for a long time. Their code will reflect an intimate knowledge of the current programming language. However, you might find that they’re less exposed to other technologies and less likely to take on new challenges.